The staff might be an early retired distance cyclist and maybe a sensible younger person who would do it as a paid gap year.

Sleeping in the motorhome very often is no good, so coin would also be needed for hotels.

Sponsors may help with bikes and equipment, but three or four £1K road bikes is not much in the grand scheme of things.

Motorhomes are not cheap, reckon about £40K for both vehicles, a bit less for wages, and another £30K or so for incidentals.

I reckon a fully funded bid could be mounted for £100K.

Sounds a lot, but as far as we know, there is still 'tens of thousands' in the kitty.

Crowdfunding the extra might not be so hard.

Sounds like a plan to me, what do you think?

Typical costings for 24x7 cover are around 3 people; that's a lot more than $40k.

I also think that crowd-funding another several tens-of-thousands is non-trivial.

But sure, the idea isnt totally out of the question. recruitment would be your main challenge - I suspect that if you found 2 of your 3 volunteers (and they were serious), then you might persuade a/the wider team (and/or Steve) to buy into this.

Or plan it yourself!

But is a UK effort optimum? Perhaps Steve's 3 slaves would rather operate on the Plains of Spain? Costs might actually be lower in other countries. Think Big but Cheap!

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Has never ridden RAAM---------No.11 Because of the great host of those who dislike the least appearance of "swank " when they travel the roads and lanes. - From Kuklos' 39 Articles

Wait and see what Steve wants to do. I think if this was presented to me in his position, I'd feel it was a takeover bid! And Steve was quite adamant he wanted to ride in the spirit of Tommy, not least to give inspiration to others. A multi-tens-of-thousands professional team effort may be impressive, but likely to be far less inspirational.

A mountain bike and CX bike is a vast difference. The skinnier CX tyres and the more aggressive position means much faster riding. It is not the bike weight. Steve already has skinny slick tyres just like Kurt, Steve already has aero bars like Kurt. So Kurt's bike might be 3kg lighter, what about the extra 20kg Kurt is hauling in his bodyweight?

You could put Steve on a £10k super bike his speed would not alter much. Bicycles are human powered, the bike weight is just a fraction of the humans bodyweight. Remove 3kg it makes such a small difference.

Basically as Steve has pointed out him self he needs to follow PROPER training to get faster, not a better bike. People like Kurt will have followed training programs most his cycling life, someone like Steve just gets on his bike and rides.

I think that it is a good idea to look at budgets for a fully funded year requiring a forensic level of detail for all costs incurred. Not only is there the running of the team, vehicles, salaries, food, accommodation, bicycles and ongoing maintenance, clothing, lighting, gps and trackers, etc., but there is also the funding of domestic costs to ensure that Steve* doesn't come home to find the gas cut off or a bailiff's note. Then there's contingency for the unexpected such as a walk on train fare some somewhere distant back to nearer home, and so on, and so on.

A mountain bike and CX bike is a vast difference. The skinnier CX tyres and the more aggressive position means much faster riding. It is not the bike weight. Steve already has skinny slick tyres just like Kurt, Steve already has aero bars like Kurt. So Kurt's bike might be 3kg lighter, what about the extra 20kg Kurt is hauling in his bodyweight?

You could put Steve on a £10k super bike his speed would not alter much. Bicycles are human powered, the bike weight is just a fraction of the humans bodyweight. Remove 3kg it makes such a small difference.

I agree. Steve's bike is a (very) red herring. ( It's often claimed he was using panniers by critics!)

The full support operation can help a lot though. As LWAB et al have described, bottle/food handups are worth time and miles. And Alicia did a hundred other small things that all made a big difference added together. Following the perfect weather round a continent made a huge difference - Alicia/Kurt have said how hard a UK-based attempt is.

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Has never ridden RAAM---------No.11 Because of the great host of those who dislike the least appearance of "swank " when they travel the roads and lanes. - From Kuklos' 39 Articles

IF I had another go, I'd definitely go the full on Team Sky route if I could. I am sure that Tommy Godwin would have done too.

Cost?Kurt spent about a dollar per mile. He paid for everything himself. All his equipment. But he had one volunteer AFAIK, not paid staff.I don't know if Kurt had the motorhome before he started.

So even from that, with paid staff etc, we're looking at hundreds, not tens of thousands of pounds even for a pretty basic set up.

Before I stopped we talked about on the road support. It would have made a difference. But fundamentally my downfall was down to both bad luck and not starting with enough fitness. We agreed that if I had road support that I'd probably get my distance up to 205 a day, but I still wouldn't do much more because I needed so much recovery to gain the speed to do more within the time we had.Take away the bad luck, we reckon I had a fair chance of clinching the record, but not by much.

I'm cool with people talking about my having another go. Nobody is pointing a gun at my head and forcing me. I see it as people down the pub planning the hypothetical perfect murder or bank job.

There is an ultra racer who uses paid staff. I have met him. I hear he has a pretty fast staff turnover because crewing for an ultra racer is a tough job, though I do hear that he pays well. Expect screaming, shouting and abuse from your rider in extreme events, it does happen.The fellow who uses paid staff is a multi millionaire who has his own business selling aircraft to the very rich. He loaned a bike to Hoppo in the Race Around Ireland. Just one of his spares he had knocking around. I reckon it was worth about £20,000.(and I set it up for Hoppo in about 5 minutes flat!)

All the other racers have volunteers instead of paid staff. It's not unheard of for crews to abandon their riders because they can't hack it. It's an often said phrase that, "your crew can't win your race for you but they sure can lose it for you."Your crew can also gain you penalties.

In theory, I should have had a follow car at all times. That was one of the reasons behind the spot tracker. The UMCA do understand how extremely difficult it would be to have a full time road crew for a whole year.They also reccommend 6 hour stints on "direct follow" (where the rider has the follow car directly behibd them at all times) There are also a lot of rules to comply with, especially on direct follow. It's really not as simple as it may seem, but still possible.

It would appear a fully funded attempt is simply not practical without the equivalent of Team Sky behind you.Kurt's approach was unique to him and his personal circumstances, as was your approach unique to you and yours.

If you do contemplate having another go at some point in the future, you have these lessons to draw upon.

However, I'm of the opinion that all of us should refrain from encouraging you to do so, at least for the moment. As others have suggested we should have the good manners to let you rest, recuperate and enjoy life for a while.

It was a long time ago now and I could be wrong, but I think Brailsford might have been asked when I was trying to start up. Having Brailsford in on it would be fantastic. And as you say, you couldn't better coaching and support than team GB/Sky.

It was a long time ago now and I could be wrong, but I think Brailsford might have been asked when I was trying to start up. Having Brailsford in on it would be fantastic. And as you say, you couldn't better coaching and support than team GB/Sky.

Nothing to stop you making another approach, but of course the decision to try again has to be taken first.

Your record is greatly in your favour, you are clearly no chancer and there's every possibility you could get the record with the appropriate training and support.

Sky like winners, supporting a rider who goes on to get the record under their banner must be an attractive prospect for them.